From Tin Foil to Sterling Silver

A smiling 8-year-old sits at her kitchen table, turning pieces of tin foil into shiny silver rings. When they're ready, she proudly shows them off to everyone in the vicinity! These days, Emily Hickman creates timeless hammered sterling silver jewelry in her Shoreline, Washington, studio that is sold in galleries and boutiques across the country.

A selection of Emily Hickman's sterling silver jewelry

Every artist's path is unique, and Hickman's was certainly circuitous. As a child, she was encouraged to try every creative thing she could, from drawing and watercolor, to pottery, papier mache, beaded jewelry and more. Her mother was an artist, drawing the illustrations for department store newspaper ads in the pre-digital age, so she witnessed art as a career early in life.

The ever-popular rectangle pendant and earrings

The childhood ring-making experience shows an early love of jewelry, too. While her mother didn't wear much, and encouraged Hickman “not to wear it all at once,” her grandmother had a huge collection of costume jewelry. Hickman inherited some of those pieces, and recalls having fun enjoying them as a kid.

In High School, she got her first taste of metalsmithing from a talented and encouraging teacher. But after that, she pursued the more traveled road of entering the work force, going through a series of boring, and physically demanding, jobs. She didn't get back into jewelry making until her 40s, when she got into bead work again. Soon it became too limiting, so she signed up for metalsmithing classes at North Seattle Community College.

Emily Hickman in her colorful studio in Shoreline, Washington

She knew almost immediately she wanted to do jewelry professionally. She was told she'd never make a living that way, so don't bother. “But I'm stubborn,” Hickman proudly announced, and moved forward anyway. By this time, those physically demanding jobs had taken a toll on her body, requiring foot surgery. She was determined to find a new career before her body gave out entirely.

Teardrop pendant
with Moonstone

As seems all too common, other events conspired to appear to steer her away from this dream, but that stubborn streak still won out. She got her business license on her birthday, April 11^th of 2006. In June that same year, right as she was setting up her tent for her first retail show, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. But rather than give it up, the metalsmithing is just what kept her sane throughout that year of treatment. Happily, she got a clean bill of health a year later.

She continued to take metalsmithing courses for about three years altogether, acquiring bits and pieces of equipment along the way to supply her own studio. A fair amount of experimentation goes on during this phase of an artist's career. Within the field of metalsmithing, there are many possible roads an artist can choose to master: stone-setting, casting, enamels, forging, lathe-turning, to name a few. A student learns them all to find out what makes her heart sing. In that process, some dead ends are inevitable.

More tools on the desk

Storage chest full of tools

Such was the case for Hickman, who had three distinctly different lines at first. It seemed a good idea at the time, because the potential market would be broad. Surely most people would like at least one of those lines, the thinking goes. Some art business classes helped her realize it's unwise to try to be all things to all people. Choose one to focus on, and let the others go. She chose the hammered silver line.

Wall of hammers for various purposes

The first iteration of this line features geometric shapes in gently-concave form with a hammered surface in either a shiny or brushed finish. This collection still makes up the foundation of her entire business. Hickman's goal was to create jewelry with both an ancient and contemporary feel, that “you could wear with either your blue jeans, or that little black dress,” she says. To achieve that timeless feel, she emphasized using tools that have been available since people first began working with metal: silver sheet, silver wire, a saw, a hammer, a drill, and a polishing method.

The Go-Go Necklace

Another piece of Hickman's jewelry philosophy is remaining neutral. Everything in her line is silver, white, black or clear. No colored stones are ever used, because “that would limit the clothing you could wear it with,” Hickman says. “If I use a garnet, you'll only wear that necklace with your red outfits.” Thus if a stone is added, it will be moonstone or white pearls only. She emphasizes that her pieces are intended to be interchangeable, too. You can have an exactly matched set if you want, but you could also pair a particular pendant shape with a differently shaped earring. Avoiding “trendy”, Hickman wants her jewelry never to go out of style.

Hickman focused on the geometric collection for the first two years of building her wholesale production jewelry business, which began a little over two years ago after some years of finding local consignment opportunities. By focusing so carefully, she has been able to build her business gradually, so that now her jewelry can be found in 17 states across the country.

Floribunda pendant and earrings with black pearl

With that foundation under her belt, she allowed herself some leeway to experiment. In March of this year, she introduced the Floribunda collection into the line, to great success. Orders from her existing customers flooded in, and new accounts were opened. While floral in shape, all other components remain the same: sterling silver with a hammered surface.

Encouraged by Floribunda's success, Hickman is now experimenting with a new collection. Inspirations for this come from mid-19th-century jewelry artists such as Alexander Calder and others who often worked in copper. Elements of Pacific Islander culture come into play as well. These pieces are mostly flat rather than domed, but maintain her line's consistency being made of sterling silver with a hammered surface. None of these are currently available in any shops, but we get a sneak peek at them here, and some will make appearances at her trunk show at Manya Vee Selects on July 19^th.

Potential future collection 

What does Hickman's future hold? “I saw a video a few years back about a 90-year old woman who was still happily making jewelry. I want to be like that!” she says with a huge smile. Her goal is to expand her wholesale business into all 50 states, “without getting so big that I can't make it all myself.” Sounds to me that we can rest assured that we'll be able to enjoy Hickman's jewelry, in all its as-yet-unseen interations, for many years to come.

Enjoy the pictures below, which provide an insight into some of the details that make up the world of a production jeweler, as she shows us how she provides consistency for quality control in the Floribunda collection.

Computerized flower patterns. Glue pattern to silver to saw out by hand.  Sheet with flowers cut out, balls for centers.

To give shape to the flat flower, it is placed in a dapping block, and a wooden dapper is tapped with a hammer.

If you can't join us for our Emily Hickman trunk show on Thursday evening, July 19, from 5 - 8 pm, stop by later to see what new treasures from Emily we have in the store.  Some of her Floribunda collection is available in our online shop, too!

Manya Vee

ManyaVeeSelects.com

It's a Wonderful Mystery: Birgit Moenig's Silk Scarves

Birgit Moenig has been sharing her love of painting on silk for over 25 years. What she loves even more than painting on silk is meeting women who feel happier because they are wearing one of her scarves. And that's what it all comes down to: bringing as much happiness as possible, through the beauty a silk scarf can bring to a person and her world.

A happy customer, wearing her
new Birgit scarf

Hailing from Germany originally, Birgit was exposed to silk painting very early. Many German housewives know how to paint on silk, so it was a common, everyday thing to do. Initially, she just picked up some silk, opened some dye, and put it on the silk as she had seen so many others do so effortlessly. She applied her artist eye to it as well, and got inspiration from other artist friends also applying dye to silk. “It's an on-going learning process even today,” she exclaims. “I still talk to my artist friends, and we are always trying new things to see what works best.”

Before painting on silk, Birgit had tried watercolor on paper, “but it didn't take,” she says. Acrylic on canvas was better, and in fact she painted and sold miniature folk paintings at the Pike Place Market when she and her husband first arrived in the States in 1980. But dyeing silk was what she really loved to do. “Designing something and staying inside the lines isn't very fun,” she says. “So I developed my silk dyeing to avoid that. It's a more abstract approach with colors overlapping and flowing together.”

Using a brush to "paint" the dye
onto the white silk

People are drawn to the beautiful colors Birgit uses on her scarves. At Manya Vee Selects, we love to watch people have their eye drawn to our scarf rack and its colorful array of her scarves. They can't resist walking over and touching them! Birgit finds the color choices and blending to be a constant challenge. “It's a wonderful mystery. When it's all done, that's when you know whether it worked or not.”    

Multi-colored scarf by Birgit

The technique is what causes the challenge. A non-toxic, water-based liquid dye is applied to dry, white silk. Colors are always more intense when they are wet, so controlling the strength of each hue is difficult. In addition, not as many colors are available as before, so that means more blending is required to achieve a full palette with lots of variety. In the end, Birgit confesses that her color choices are very intuitive. Of course, I have a feeling her 25 years of experience helps guide the intuition to get her beautiful results.

Birgit's scarf rack at Manya Vee Selects

Birgit works with her husband, Dieter, closely these days. This teamwork began when he lost all contracts for his own business after 9/11. He had been making high-tech satellites for ships. That left him with a lot of time on his hands. One piece of equipment he used in his business is a water-jet, which can cut cleanly through metals. He designed some 3-D ornaments made out of Boeing surplus aluminum, each one cut with that water jet. They were very successful. More designs followed based on customer requests.

Next, customers began asking for 3-D earrings. This required much smaller pieces, and thus more precision in cutting. His huge machine wasn't made for such detail. Upon discovering it would cost $28,000 to re-tool it, he gave up for a while. But the requests kept coming, so he figured out a way to re-tool it himself, costing only $2,000. He graduated the metal to titanium since aluminum has such a low perceived value, and grew his own customer base with this new product.

Three notKnot styles

A scarf woven into a
notKnot

The next product he invented ties Dieter's and Birgit's respective products together very closely – the notKnot! Based on a concept floating around in Birgit's head, each notKnot is cut out with the water jet using thick stainless steel. It allows a person a great deal of flexibility in how to wear the scarves, by weaving them in and out of the openings, making the scarf a bit more like a piece of jewelry.

Now, in addition to showing her scarves at Manya Vee Selects in Edmonds, they tour the country together doing art fairs and selling their wares together, finding new fans at each new show they do. Birgit loves returning to a place and meeting customers for a second, third and fourth time. It gives her great joy to hear how much the women enjoy wearing her scarves. It is an extra special day when someone sends her a card or email letting her know how much they love wearing her scarves.

Birgit and Dieter at an art show

We're in our 12^th year now at Manya Vee Selects, and Birgit is one of just a few artists whose work we've carried since the beginning.  Her scarves find passionate new wearers almost daily. We love passing along those stories to Birgit from our own customers, who simply can't resist that scarf rack and end up buying one, then two, then another for a gift, and so on. Go ahead and write your story here in the comments about your Birgit scarves, so we can share it with her too.

And of course, make your own pilgrimage to The Scarf Rack, and see for yourself how happy and beautiful a new Birgit scarf can make you feel!

See you soon,

Manya

P.S.  Here are links to previous blogs that show some scarf-tying methods.

http://manyaveeselects.blogspot.com/2011/11/3-scarf-ideas-to-spiff-up-your-wardrobe.html

http://manyaveeselects.blogspot.com/2010/07/from-neophyte-to-expert-in-2-hours.html

April 16, 2012

The Almost Lost Art of Plique A Jour

Egyptian enameled jewelry

Enameled jewelry has been around a long time, going as far back as the ancient Egyptians.  But what is it exactly? It is taking powdered glass and heating it up until it melts and fuses onto a metal backing.  The powder melts, then flows, and finally hardens when the heat is reduced.  It is a wonderful way to add color to metal without using stones.

Ricky Frank
Pendant

Some contemporary American jewelers have brought new innovations and mastery to this technique, layering and layering various colors to achieve amazingly beautiful results that are so full of life.  One of my favorites is Ricky Frank.  He says "I create miniature worlds of light and color in enamel".

The traditional method of enameling has a metal backing behind the enamel, or powdered glass.  Another style is less common nowadays, but quite beautiful, resulting in a magical interaction with the metal and the glass.  There are very few artists working with enamel this way because it is quite technically challenging.  The technique is called Plique-a-Jour, which means "letting in daylight."  This goblet was made that way in about 1890 in Russia.

Russian Plique-a-Jour Goblet, ca 1890

Lalique Brooch

The plique-a-jour method still uses powdered glass, but instead of applying it on TOP of metal, the artist cuts out shapes within the metal, and puts the powdered glass in those open spaces.  Now when it's fired, and melts, and gets hard again, the glass doesn't have anything behind it.  The light can shine through, creating a sort of stained glass effect.  Famous art nouveau glass and jewelry designer Rene Lalique used this technique delicately and beautifully.

Dorner "Wave" earrings

A local artist, Diane Dorner, has enjoyed making earrings with this technique, resulting in some very fun and unusual earrings.  She uses fine silver (pure silver with no other components added) because it interacts more gracefully with the enamel.  She cuts out the outer shape using a jeweler's saw.  Then, she drills a tiny hole into the shape to create an open space inside it.  She inserts her tiny jeweler's saw to then create the shape she wants.  She repeats this technique numerous times to get the final look.

Then she chooses the color or colors of enamel she wants to use, and lays it out carefully.  It usually takes multiple firings and applications of the enamel to get a thick enough piece of glass that will be strong and stand the test of time.  It gets fired in a kiln that heats up to 1380 - 1560 degrees Fahrenheit.

Dorner "window" earrings

It might seem like the extensive labor involved would make these quite expensive, but they are not as crazy as you might think.  Diane's earrings sell for $90 - $140.  The more expensive ones have gemstones set into them as well.

Dorner "Lime Bubbles" earrings

Wearing a pair of these earrings is sure to elicit comments of wonder, as the light glows beautifully through the glass.  It has a sort of stained glass window effect.  It is so unusual that people will really want to know what it is!  So enjoy sharing a moment of beauty with complete strangers as you wear them.  What a respite from the depressing news we encounter every day!

I'm sure you know, dear readers, that this is my reason for being - to share a moment of beauty with you, as well as with all the people around us - friends and strangers alike.  I invite you to share your story of shared beauty with all of us right here in the comments!

Manya Vee
ManyaVeeSelects.com

Getting the color right

What do you do when you lose faith in your own judgment of yourself due to long-term put-downs?  Well, you do what most anyone would do.  You start shopping for those things that attract the least amount of attention to yourself as possible.  After all, choose something that speaks to your heart, and you are guaranteed a barrage of negative comments enough to make someone want to hole up in a cave for a bit longer than a hibernation season.

That's what had happened to a delightful customer visiting from Illinois.  Debbie M. has endured many years of having her creative juices squelched.  And squelched hard.  As we spoke about it further, more and more examples were brought to Debbie's mind about how so many aspects of her life had squelched what had been a vibrantly creative mind as a child.

She desperately wanted help learning how to choose clothing and jewelry that would be attractive and fun.  She came in dressed in a white top with a black cami, a tan skirt, and tan thongs.  It turns out that her coloring is far more suited to warm tones like coral, mossy greens, turquoise, warm browns and such.  The white washed out her skin completely.  Her silver jewelry dampened the lovely peach-tones of her skin too.

We played around with a variety of things - especially those with gold-tone metals in colors that complimented her skin tone.  The best part of all was that as soon as we put those colors next to her skin, she herself could immediately see how much better the colors worked!  She'd just been told so many times that she made bad choices, that she didn't trust her judgment anymore!  Well today, she learned how to trust herself all over again.  And she went home with some lovely new jewelry to prove it to herself!  Check it out!

What colors look best on you?  Not sure?  Come on in and let's play a bit!

Manya Vee
manyaveeselects.com

A Magic Moment - customer, gallery, and artist connect!

It happened last Saturday.  A semi-regular customer came into the gallery.  M.R. was checking out the latest wearable art offerings rather leisurely when her hand rested upon a chrome and black peluche wrap by Laura Lawrence.  M.R. has the most amazing head of silver, straight, thick, wonderful hair.  The wrap would look amazing on her.

Laura's wraps come to life when worn on the body.  The hanger just doesn't cut it.  So, I took it off the hanger and wrapped it around my own body to show M.R. the variety of ways it can be worn, and to show her how beautifully it moves on the body.  She was intrigued and mesmerized by its beauty.


Off comes her coat.  Her purse gets absent-mindedly placed on the floor.  And she wraps herself in the soft and gentle beauty and takes a look in the mirror.  Yep.  It looked like it had been made especially with her in mind.  She has fun playing with all the ways it can be worn.  Open in the front with lapels.  One side draped across the front.  Both ends captured across the shoulders.  And so on.


As you can now imagine, it went home with her.  She was so very pleased with it that a thank you needed to be delivered to the artist.  Here's a bit of what she said: "Yesterday I purchased one of your beautiful Double Peluche Capes in Edmonds, WA from Manya Vee Selects.  The moment I saw it I "bonded" and knew that I had created an intention at some previous moment in time to have a "made for me" work of wearable art. My cape is chrome and black and compliments and enhances my long silver [chrome?] hair- a big consideration when buying clothing! The other part of this story is that I had JUST picked up a custom ring which I had spent weeks/months designing and refining with the jewelers. Some how this all fits together- maybe a sign about how very important our creative contributions are to the world. Thank you so very much for your generous, lovely art. I LOVE my new cape and will think of the love that helped create it as I wear it with the memories already created!"


Laura was totally blown away by receiving such heart-felt gratitude about something she had created with her own hands.  She responded thusly:  "What a lovely surprise to receive your email--thank you so much for writing! As someone who has gone "natural" with my hair color, I certainly can relate to what you said regarding the silver [chrome]. I must say how pleased I have been with the silver with black accents. I hope you enjoy many hours of feeling hugged in it.  Thank you again for taking the time to write me."


And now, the shared moments of beauty will happen with M.R. as she wears her lovely wearable art!  She will be one of those bringing a smile and a sense of awe about the amazing beauty of creativity and excellent craftsmanship each time she wears it.  How cool is that?!?!?!?


Manya
manyaveeselects.com

And So It Begins!

The one, the only, Manya Vee Selects blog!  We invite you to post comments and thoughts on our posts as often as possible!  We'd love to have a conversation with you in this way.  We can talk about art, creativity, beauty, and how those things affect our daily lives.

I'm sure you all know by now that for me, incorporating art into every aspect of your life is a very powerful thing.  Eating your breakfast out of a hand-painted Fiala bowl instead of Corelle gets you ready for the day like nothing else.  Especially if you use a beaded spoon as a vehicle!

Wear it. Dine on it. Burn it. Burn things in it.  Put flowers in it.  Look at it.  Look at yourself in it. Eat it. Smell it.  And that's just the beginning.  For some reason, so many of us struggle with feeling like we somehow don't deserve to use special things.  Maybe that Puritan streak hasn't gone out of our systems yet.  But just let your mind wander a bit to consider how much more alive you'd feel if you actually allowed those things.  Surrounding yourself with joyfully created art that you can use makes that joy come alive in you as well, and may even ignite your own fires of creativity if you're not careful!

Let's hear how you incorporate art into your everyday life!

--Manya